Posted
by
kdawsonon Monday March 08, 2010 @09:15AM
from the get-yours-at-ikea dept.

Pickens writes "The Telegraph reports that Apple is developing technology, already being nicknamed the 'iKey,' which will allow users to gain access to their office and unlock their car or front door with a single electronic device like an iPhone. Users would simply have to enter a PIN and wave the device over an electronic pad fitted beside a door to open it. 'The device can communicate with an external device to open a lock. By way of example, the electronic device may be a model of an iPhone,' says the newly released patent application. 'The external device may be any suitable electronic device such as a portable media player, personal data assistant or electronic lock that may be used to access a door, car, house, or other physical area.' The technology behind the invention is known as Near Field Communication; it allows electronic devices to transmit information when in proximity. 'If true, it's a very big deal. As well as opening doors and unlocking your car, it could also turn your iPhone into an electronic wallet and ID card,' says Leander Kahney, a consumer technology expert. 'The trouble is that the technology hasn't gone completely mainstream. If Apple were to adopt the technology, they would likely set the standard, and that would drive widespread adoption as everyone scrambles to make their systems iPhone-friendly.'"

What's new here is that Apple is possibly thinking of making this a standard while owning critical patents on it, then after this is widespread (if it ever happens) crackdown on competition using its patents.

Apple is becoming more evil lately, see the recent attempt to shut down competition on smartphones from HTC using completely trivial software patents [mozillazine.org] (the original article is from LWN [lwn.net], I highly suggest getting a subscription there).

NFC has been patented for the purposes mentioned in apples patent for sure.
Where is apple in this chart? [blogspot.com]
Of course the innovation here is that it is an iPhone that uses NFC and not some other manufacturers phone.

What should be news is that other companies have tried to push NFC for almost a decade, but consumers never seemed to care enough to get critical mass. Now Apple swoops in, tells the media "it's a phone... and an iKey!" and soon enough we'll have hundreds of solutions compatible only with the iPhone and Apple will get credit for the whole technology.

Other phone companies need to grow a spine and learn some marketing, now.

The reason it has not taken off is that I can get a spare key made cheaply in any town. If I replace my locks with Apple iLocks you can bet I will have to pay quite a bit for iKeys every time I need a new one. I also won't be able to get in if my iPhone battery is dead and that is my only iKey.

It will only take off if it is really open standard so that consumers can get cheap locks and keys. That doesn't sound like the sort of thing Apple would do. Then again a lot of people seem happy to buy music in AAC f

Yes, DRM'ed AAC files will only play on Apple devices and in iTunes (Mac OS X and Windows).

But you seem to be under the impression that AAC [wikipedia.org] is an Apple technology limited to Apple devices.

Just FYI, more than a year ago Apple was allowed by the music labels to remove all DRM from the audio files sold on the iTunes Store, that's why there is three tunes prices now instead of one. Apple also increased the bitrate to 256kbps.

Your CD isn't lossless either, at least compared to a very high quality analog deck.

The iTunes/iPod ecosystem allows exactly the system you want (it's flexible that way) to allow you to rip lossless from CDs as well as make lower bitrate copies. The point here wasn't that Apple is selling non-lossless music, but that they sell non-DRM music that is in AAC format - which was erroneously described as a "locked to Apple devices only" format, when it is clearly nothing of the sort.

My problem with it is entering a PIN to unlock a door; it's easire to just stick a key in and turn it. My car already has a remote unlocker, and all I have to do is push a button. It's a step forward from the mechanical key, having to enter a PIN is a step backwards.

Someone should come up with an equivalent of Godwin's Law when it comes to branding some companies "Evil"

What does it mean? It's a non-argument that stifles debate. Why is X suing Y? Because they are EVIL! It's an infantile attack that does very little to explore the nuances of the complicated patent law landscape and goes for the intellectually lazy answer.

If Apple wanted to shut down the competition they'd sue Android producing OEM's from day 1. Truth of the matter is, HTC is going out of its way along with help from Google to ape every feature of iPhone instead of actually coming up with novel ways of doing things. It's like ripping off the act of a successful comedian and calling it competition. Come up with your own damn material.

a lot of the iphone capabilities aren't new: the new thing they're bringing is huge market penetration to the degree that it's worth other manufacturer's designing products to work with it. Apple's sheer volume could make it commercially viable to make, say, an add-on for car alarms that unlocks based on proximity with the device - which is technically possible now but hasnt' really taken off.

I've notice the most "Ground Breaking" "NEW" technologies in recent years aren't actually new, just someone to took some tech that was out there and actually applied it in a useful way. see: Google, Apple, Nintendo, et al.

Honestly there's nothing wrong with that, technology is useless unless it's applied, and I'm sure there are still a lot of applications for existing tech that hasn't been explored yet.

Seems like a bad implementation to me. Why not have a small, pen-drive sized device that has a thumbprint scanner. When touched, the scanner would generate a one-time passkey, based on time/print which the device could verify using a private key (to prevent eavesdropping/copying). Seems stupid to have to get some device out, switch it on, then enter a keycode - if it's more cumbersome than current technology (keyfob, metal key) it's unlikely to take off, aside from amongst the usual Apple fan-boys.

The same can be done with bluetooth as well. I don't know about the security (probably poor), but it's certainly possible to use my ancient Sony-Ericsson mobile phone to lock and unlock eg an X session under Linux, by proximity. If a car runs Linux, then... (it would never crash, but you'd have to assemble it yourself from bit parts from all over the web, using mostly outdated information, and it would only run on three year old roads -- but at least you would be able to unlock it with your phone).

Nothing new about Apple patenting existing apps I guess. Though as mentioned, it's not mainstream, having an iphone adapter in the car to play music, and using that same phone to open the door makes sense.

In practice the only way to gain access to the locations secured by physical keys is to steal them, doing it without the persons knowledge means stealing them, copying them and returning them without the persons knowledge.

It may be possible to crack the encryption (if there is any, many such secure systems claim to have encryption but do not) on this RFID technology at range with an antenna that can not be seen.

In practice the only way to gain access to the locations secured by physical keys is to steal them, doing it without the persons knowledge means stealing them, copying them and returning them without the persons knowledge.

It may be possible to crack the encryption (if there is any, many such secure systems claim to have encryption but do not) on this RFID technology at range with an antenna that can not be seen.

I can see the next gone in 60 seconds. How they stick a second android phone in her purse (or something close to the Iphone) perp walks up to the persons car, house, etc. It sends the query over the celluar network from the first phone, to the second phone, to their Iphone, then sends the response back for yours to retransmit. Although to be movie worthy I guess it will need to be a stripper getting close...

It's pretty irrelevant for me anyway. I only have 3 keys:
My work - of coarse they won't change that to work with an iPhone.
My apartment - I doubt my landlords would let me change the locks.
My car - It would probably be pretty expensive to add this system to it.

I for one don't consider it "bad" if stupid people get punished for using "0000" as their PIN.

Hey... we are long overdue for some regular punishment of stupidity.There are no longer wild bears roaming the streets at night, eating stupid people. Haven't been any for centuries.Wee need something to eliminate those genes from the pool.

Which explains why there are no stupid people in those parts of Alaska, Russia, and Finland which also have very low populations. (Obviously there are no wild bears in downtown Wasilla.) Unfortunately, the only check on unlimited fecundity in most of the world now is inability to feed the little rugrats, and we are working hard to eliminate that limitation as well.

And yes, I'm also in favor of eliminating caution signs and lane markers on highways to encourage people to hang up the cell phone and pay atte

Can we save some of the beautiful/physically gifted/creative/emotionally attuned/kind/brave - but not massively intelligent people too ? It's just that any kind of genetic cleansing would leave the gene pool diminished and weaker, and a human race consisting of just high IQ people would disappear up it's own backside quicker than you can say 'intelectual snob'.

Or a house that locks you out when the power fails? Or worse, one that "fails safe" and DOESN'T lock strangers out when the power fails?

If you have this be the lock on the door, then you deserve it. It's much more likely to be like the buzzer system to an apartment where it's part of the door frame. You can still use the key to unlock the door, but the buzzer/ikey portion makes it so the "locked" door opens when you pull on it.

.The trouble is that the technology hasn't gone completely mainstream. If Apple were to adopt the technology, they would likely set the standard, and that would drive widespread adoption as everyone scrambles to make their systems iPhone-friendly.

Isn't this already very common in Japan?

And what employer would want to tie an identification/access system to a highly attractive theft target?

Try not to mention Asian telco networks, speed or their state of tech.
Let the locals enjoy their futuristic beads and mirrors.
A highly attractive theft target would be a blogger working at google with an iphone?
With their iphone near your new icutting equipped jailbroken iphone you can enter their home. Plant a physical keystroke logger, no need for an IE link click.
Hack different for the government or corporation paying your bills with the new icutter - clones any ikeys in range and all gps data too, j

What happens when someone breaks the security on the device/ technology? A thief would be able to get into your house and rob everything, make an escape in your car, and then empty your bank account all for cracking just 4 numbers.
I think I'll stick to the old manual lock and key thank you.

You have far too much faith in old-fashioned keys. Locks are there to keep honest people honest.

The real problem is that this is tied to a device which is designed to be replaced every other year. It's far from durable enough to be used as a house key, or even a car key. I'm carrying a wireless car key in my pocket, but I change the batteries on it maybe once a year, and the batteries cost $10. Not only can you not carry a spare battery for an iPhone, but you have to recharge it daily. Completely impractical for a key.

You have far too much faith in old-fashioned keys. Locks are there to keep honest people honest.

If someone is trying to open my front door with a crowbar, someone else might get suspicious. If they're trying to open it with my iPhone, which would be the normal way I'd open my door, no one would even notice.

Locks may just keep honest people honest, but switching to something that can be so much more easily faked just lowers the bar of "honesty."

While overplayed it does work. Just Google for it, there are many stories on the technique. Google stores about a bic pen insert and a major lock company. Then to top it off realize that many Ford owners can either unlock or start older Ford cars other people own, most likely works for the majority of brands. Newer keys with embedded micro chips at least stop people from starting your car but rarely do they stop someone from unlocking your car.

If someone tried to break into my house then (I hope) my neighbours would notice, most burglars are not sophisticated...... anyone could easily clone a key and just walk in, but strangely most burglaries are still forced entry....because it is simpler

High res images at a couple of hundred metres (high enough to read the peaks on your house key) between the time it takes you to take your keys from your pocket and put the key in the lock is well into the realm of serious photographic equipment and prowess (insuring your camera and lens for more than your car).

As for lock picking, have you ever seen someone do it? A seriously good lockpick will spend a good 15 minutes on his knees fiddling around with the tumblers (on a pin tumbler lock, forget lever locks) and is only really feasible if you have expensive locks. Otherwise the barrel will be drilled out as it is more efficient.

An opportunist thief will always go for the weakest point of failure; Smash the door, break a window etc. They don't care about keeping it neat, just about getting in and out as fast as possible.

As for lock picking, have you ever seen someone do it? A seriously good lockpick will spend a good 15 minutes on his knees fiddling around with the tumblers (on a pin tumbler lock, forget lever locks) and is only really feasible if you have expensive locks. Otherwise the barrel will be drilled out as it is more efficient.

I had a friend in HS who used to hang out with me and wander the halls after school while waiting for my older brother to get done with which ever sport was in season at the time. I never got the hang of it, but he used to pick the locks to various classrooms. He'd get us into the computer lab for some solitaire time, into the chemistry lab so that he could steal a really nice digital scale to sell to the local pot dealer, or into the storage closet just to see what was in there. It usually only took him

I lock my doors so that burglers are likely to smash something to get in.

Yeah, they could pick my deadbolts, but it would take a good locksmith multiple minutes to do so.

What burglers do is go to the back door and kick it open. The way my deadbolts are installed with metal sleves in the frame, they would have to break the entire doorframe to gain entrance. Otherwise I have some deadbolts with knobs on the inside and glass doors, which they could break the glass then unlock the deadbolts. Once again they would leave physical evidence.

I consider my locks:

There to keep my friends out when I don't want them in.

There to leave physical evidence of a break in for my insurance company.

I trust my locks to be strong enough against the average burglar to make them bypass them entirely, and honestly I think that's all you can expect in residential security. I enjoy having a sunroom and don't want to live in a fortress to protect against a small risk.. Instead I live how I want and protect against loss through insurance.

What happens when someone breaks the security on your keyring? A thief who stole your keys would be able to get into your house and rob everything, and make an escape in your car.

If they steal your wallet while they're about it, they can empty your bank account too.

While it's good to think about security, you've gotta actually compare the hypothetical worst case scenario of the new technology with a similar worst case scenario with the old technology (providing they require similar amounts effort/skill).

What happens when someone breaks the security on your keyring? They gain access to whatever you've protected by it, obviously. How is this different than a person who gains access to your physical keyring? They gain access to whatever you've got keys for.

In the current "security model", the reality is, most of us protect our property with insurance, really. If someone steals it, a claim is filed and you're compensated for the loss. (You may also qualify for a tax write-off for the loss on the next year

It's worth remembering that most consumer grade locks can be opened by a moderately skilled locksmith in seconds while leaving no trace

Skilled locksmiths are very carefull to keep that fact as secret as possible. How else could they charge you for a) opening your lock (in case you locked yourself out) AND IN ADDITION for b) an new lock cause your old one suffered some 'damage' in the course of a).

Yeah, which means you're essentially forced to carry a set of regular keys for your car, house, etc. anyway.

No, you bury your spare house key in the flower bed at a precise coordinate in a vacuum packed plastic bag. When I was a kid my parents had a combination lock on a lock box bolted to the concrete in the garage, with about 100 different keys inside only one of which worked, essentially a poor mans safe.

As for the car key, you can buy flat credit card sized keys from most locksmiths that fit in your wallet for a very small cost. In 12 years I've used mine 3 times, once by locking the keys in the car, once b

That was my first thought. My second was that I don't see how fishing my iPod/iPhone/other device out of my pocket and entering a pass code is any easier than fishing my keys out and unlocking the door normally.

Cooler, yes, and one less thing to carry around, but easier and more reliable?

This could be a great excuse though.1. Pick up girl in bar2. Take "home" to poshest, grandest, most expensive-looking villa/mansion in the city3. "Awwww, sorry, honey, battery on my iKey's flat. How about we just go to your place and I'll show you my master bedroom tomorrow instead?"4. ?????5. Return to Mom's basement before she (mom or girl) wakes up.

An entire industry gears up to create technologies for short range wireless communications in order to replace keys. Several companies already have solutions in the market, but they haven't caught on yet because the technology isn't quite ready yet and not quite cheap enough.

If things continue along Apple's usual path then: (1) Apple starts patenting the obvious applications of those technologies, something other people weren't even considering because that's what those technologies were designed for, (2) Apple starts adding immature implementations of the feature to their products at a premium price that only Apple customers would be willing to pay and gets accolades for how "innovative" they are, and (3) a few years later when other people are starting to offer mass market products at mass market prices, Apple starts suing them for patent violations.

(3) a few years later when other people are starting to offer mass market products at mass market prices, Apple starts suing them for patent violations.

Citation needed.

And I don't mean the recent Nokia patent suit. Many of the iPhone patents were not obvious technologies because a boatload of them were created for this purpose. Sure, they're obvious *now* since everyone and their brother is making a multitouch phone with an accelerometer, light sensor, compass, proximity sensor, and tilt sensor, but back in 2005 these things were rare or non-existent.

Several companies already have solutions in the market, but they haven't caught on yet because the technology isn't quite ready yet and not quite cheap enough.

"isn't quite ready" ? "not cheap enough" ? You need to research that a little bit more. For at least a decade I've never worked at a place without those electric door "key card" locks. Every my kids daycare used them. Both my jobs, my wifes job, daycare, all use the same type of card.

The cards are about $4 and the little pencil-eraser keychain fobs cost a whopping $8. Now this is from a reseller like smarthome.com. Wholesale in bulk they are probably about half that. Most businesses charge like $50 for a lost card, not because it costs $50 but to scare and intimidate the employees (some bosses love that) and also to make up for the labor cost of issuing another card. They are cheap enough to put in a house, and I've been seriously considering it.

I integrated mine with my ipod by purchasing a silicone stretchy case and placing the credit card sized doorcard behind the ipod in the stretchy. It was actually quite inconvenient and I was worried I'd drop the ipod so I stopped doing that. It was more convenient to have them separate.

I think they are hurrying up, because the provider has long sold a little pencil eraser shaped fob, and I know people whom have made bracelets out of them. A wee bit smaller and they could be mounted in a ring. That would be quite convenient, since my had is usually near the door when I'm opening the door.

And of course, (just like the app-store) if you are wearing just a bikini... the doors just won't open.

Yeah I know what you're trying to say, but technically, you can already purchase, for several years now, "door keycard" technology in a form factor the shape and size of a very small pen cap, for about twice the cost of a traditional credit card shaped keycard. I believe you're supposed to put it on a keychain, but there are other possibilities. Luckily there are no sharp edges. So, the bikini ladies can theoretically carry two door fobs, and the guys can carry one. This also has the benefit that people

I can currently do this with my Zipcar app http://www.zipcar.com/iphone/ [zipcar.com] . It allows you to unlock, lock and honk your cars horn. It does this using your EDGE/3G connection, so not near-field/RFID however, same kind of thing is currently being done.

You know, with Apple products experiencing something of a resurgence in the past 5-10 years and their popularity slowly increasing, they will eventually cross that invisible line where hackers decide that it becomes worth their time to attack Apple products the way they attack Windows. The fact that people are sold Apple products under the guise of security and not having to worry about compromised hardware/software means they won't see it coming and won't know how to deal with it, either.

Pre OS X, Apple had lots of worms, virus like apps, malware, trojans and loggers ect.
What can really be noted for OS X security after many years?
Fake flash installers, physical access loggers and ???
Where are the FAQ pages to pop any Mac hitting a web site or just connecting to the net?
As for Apple DRM, that will be wide open:)

Luckily it will be very straightforward to protect yourself from hackers: an old fashioned lock will do.

I would never connect my front door or car to anything that is on any network. I am the one with the keys now - that's a very nice feeling.

The motivation for hackers now is to gain control of a computer to make a few euro/dollars. If they can steal a car, or just open a front door and walk in - I dunno - I can just imagine that they are much more motivated to hack even small niche technologies.

All I'm saying is that a LOT of Apple customers are your average consumer without a lot of computer knowledge who have bought Apple products under the impression that they are secure and safe. Once Apple's marketshare gets big enough to make them a worthwhile target of hackers and virus writers, it's not going to be pretty.

Yes, but Microsoft doesn't advertise their products as being secure and safe from viruses...Apple specifically states in their advertising that Macs don't suffer from those issues (which, at this point, is mostly true).

This is a bad idea. Mainly because the iPhone doesn't have a very sophisticated security architecture, so any cryptographic keys and wallet information are fundamentally vulnerable to theft. This is best demonstrated by the recent attack where a handful of SMS messages was sufficient to give an attacker root on the device. If you're going to put something like this into widespread deployment you at very least want to include some sort of hardware security module to validate the software and store cryptographic secrets.

Right now I wouldn't want to use the iPhone (or any Android phone, for that matter) to store any kind of critical secrets.

It's also generally a bad idea to create a 'standard' on a proprietary, licenced technology as other companies will create competing 'standards'. If they offer the patents, connectors, etc, up for public domain, I'll start to be interested. Without an open standard, you'll have to have a pocket full of different electronic devices rather that a pocket full of keys.

1. You can tuck a key under the doormat if you lose the ones in your pocket. Not so electronic gadget.
2. As somebody else mentioned - flat battery? lose access to all your property. Flat battery in the lock or power cut in the house? lose access.
3. Replacing locks just got a whole lot more expensive and no doubt all lock makers would have to have some kind of license agreement with Apple. In short, LAME.
This seems to be technology for technology's sake. I can see pretty much nothing but downsides to thi

"iKey and iLock, for lack of a more creative product name
Give me a tiny device the size of a flash drive that I can encode with some unique ID like a segment of my DNA. When I get within 2 feet of my office, my car, my house, or whatever locked item it is, it reads the code from the device in my pocket and unlocks the electronic lock. No more carrying 200 keys around like some medieval jailer. 2007 is half over and we're still securing our possessions with medieval technology.

"The remote-access computer transponder called the "joymaker" is your most valuable single possession in your new life. If you can imagine a combination of telephone, credit card, alarm clock, pocket bar, reference library, and full-time secretary, you will have sketched some of the functions provided by your joymaker. " From The Age of the Pussyfoot [wikipedia.org], published in 1966 by Frederic Pohl. (I read this as a scholastic bookclub selection if fifth grade, It's been obvious for a few years now that the iPhone is well on it's way to becoming a "joymaker", this patent brings it even closer.

So instead of punching my PIN number directly into the lock on my car or house, which have had PIN based locks available for decades, I instead pull out my phone, load my iKey app, and punch my PIN in there? Is this really easier or more secure?

Watching your neighbour spending hundreds or more than a thousand to outfit their home with an iLock and having their iPhone run out of juice or fumbling and dropping/breaking it before they could unlock the front door.... Priceless.

Watching your neighbour spending hundreds or more than a thousand to outfit their home with an iLock and having their iPhone run out of juice or fumbling and dropping/breaking it before they could unlock the front door.... Priceless.

Do you ever feel ashamed of the fact that a TV commercial has infiltrated your mind to the point that you spout off imitations of it? And is it really that fun to see your neighbor make bad decisions?

What happens when Apple decides that I should be locked out of my car because I drove past the local porn shop and they consider that a TOS violation? And how do I know they arn't going to purposely brick my key if I make after-market changes to my car?

How is this more convenient? If mere proximity were sufficient (as in the Prius key) it might be interesting, but if I have to pull out a device and tap in a pin to make it work, that's hardly more convenient than having a key that I had to pull out and fit into the lock. And what happens when the device runs out of grunt? Do I have to find a charger before I can get into my house? Maybe not if I can still use a conventional key. But if I have to keep a key with me anyway, what value, other than excru

So, say this does catch on and people start getting house doors and cars compatible with this. What if there's an emergency and I have to get into the house of a family member or friend and I don't have an iphone or whatever it'll take the pop the lock? If there's an emergency, I doubt they're going to be able to hand me their phone or whatever this device might be...and what if they're so used to using this device to open all their doors and they don't have a physical key on them?

Nice, you've discovered the best way to make a link unclickable in Slashdot. I can't even highlight and select "Go To URL", because it's already a link (to your comment, which doesn't have any content).